Speech and Hearing Science Commons^™

Impact Of Language Sampling Context On Language Productivity And Complexity, Trina J. Tolentino

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Language sampling is a familiar tool in the speech-language pathologist’s (SLP’s) repertoire, used to assess a student’s language ability and inform treatment targets. The current literature has several studies comparing various dimensions of language sampling context, but with relatively small samples. The goal of this study was to identify what sampling contexts elicit the most productive and complex language, thereby contributing insight into what conditions may yield the most accurate representation of a child’s language skill, as well as the resulting intervention focus.

One-thousand thirty-seven kindergarten, first-, second-, and third-grade students (mean age [years; months] ≈ 7;5; range = 5;0-10;9), …

Phonological Milestones For African American English-Speaking Children Learning Mainstream American English As A Second Dialect, Barbara Zurer Pearson, Shelley Velleman, Tiffany Charko, Timothy J. Bryant

Barbara Zurer Pearson

Purpose: This study provides milestones for phonological development in African American English (AAE) speakers learning Mainstream American English (MAE) as a second dialect for use by practicing speech-language pathologists. Method: The Dialect Sensitive Language Test (DSLT, Seymour et al., 2000) was administered to a nationwide sample of typically-developing children ages 4-12: 537 speakers of AAE as a first dialect and 317 speakers of MAE as a first dialect. DSLT items tested all consonant segments and many clusters of MAE in initial and final position. The age at which each dialect group reached 90% criterion for each segment in each position …